Having thus silenced that loose tongue, Odysseus mounted a platform, whence he could be seen and heard of all the host, and lifting up his mighty voice he began to rebuke the people for their weakness and want of faith. "Must I speak to you," he said, "as to homesick women and children, or as to veteran warriors bound by an oath to follow their great captain for weal or for woe? Not that I blame you overmuch, for indeed your service has been both long and hard. For nine long years we have toiled in vain, and the cordage of our ships is rotten, and their timbers are warped. Nevertheless, endure yet a little while, until we have learnt whether the son of Cronos is a true prophet or no. Ye cannot have forgotten the day when our ships were assembled at Aulis, or the portents vouchsafed us there at a solemn sacrifice to the gods. The altar was raised in the shadow of a goodly plane-tree, near a running water; and in the tree was a nest of sparrows, a mother with eight young, cheeping and cowering beneath the leaves. Just as we were kindling the altar fire, a great serpent, with blood-red back, darted up from the altar into the tree and pounced upon the sparrows' nest. The mother-bird fluttered anxiously around, uttering piteous cries to see the monster devouring her young; and the serpent, when he had swallowed up the nestlings, caught their mother by the wing as she hovered near, and swallowed her also. Then we beheld a wonder: for the serpent, when he came down from the tree, was turned into a stone. And while we stood amazed Calchas declared unto us the meaning of that omen: "Why stand ye thus amazed, ye warriors of Greece? That which ye have seen is a sign from Zeus, and this is the interpretation thereof: the nine birds are the nine years, during which we shall lay siege to Troy, and the serpent is the tenth year, in which Troy shall fall! Therefore abide steadfast, my comrades, for the nine years are passed, and we are nearing the end of our labours." Odysseus ended, and a great roar of acclamation went up from a hundred thousand throats, and rolled like thunder along the hollow shore. The next speaker was Nestor, who addressed Agamemnon, and bade him command an immediate muster of the whole army, and lead a general attack upon the Trojans. "Let the people," said he, "be ordered according to their several tribes and clans, that thou mayest distinguish the faint-hearted from the loyal and valiant. Thus shall thou learn, if disaster befalleth thee, to whom it is due--whether to adverse heaven, or to the cowardice and weakness of thine allies."